Vance Jaqua wrote:

Paul and guys - I had some slack time out in the
garage so I thought I would see if the scheme I
proposed would really function. So I hacked out about
a half scale working model out of some aluminum hunks
I could find. The blade shanks seem to want a bit more
support as there is sometimes a tendency to bind from
the actuation side loads on the pins. But the
principle is sound. It actuates by turning the bolt
head which drives a 3/8 coarse thread. It works quite
well about plus or minus 15 degrees off mid point
which should be more than enough range (I am not ready
for reverse Beta). BTW on the blade shape - it might
be best to set the rotational axis in front of the
center of lift for the foils to keep a steady load
against the back lash.
If I get ambitious Sunday and come to the Santa Paula
airport, I will try to bring it along for your
amusement - Vance
These are "Snappy" captures off my camcorder - so they
are not up to scanned foto quality -VJ

Here are a couple more pictures Vance sent.

I did not go the route that Vance did here as I wanted to
minimize the size of the housing and make it out of welded
up 4130 steel relatively small tubing.  I also wanted to
minimize the size of the holes necessary for the pitch change
mechanism in the main housing to keep the stress concentrations 
down.

We both are using Vance's idea of having the balls lock in
the prop shanks. I am also using a needle bearing alignment
tube to prevent the binding Vance mentioned above.

Paul Lamar
 
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